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Finding Duplicates

The duplicate utility finds photos and videos with the same visual fingerprint. Use it as a review workflow, not as an automatic delete button.

The duplicate scan configuration with one four-file sample directory

How Duplicate Detection Works

Yaffo scans the selected directories recursively and calculates a perceptual hash from each photo. For a video, it hashes an indexed poster or a frame extracted from the video. Files with the same media type and hash are grouped together, even when their filenames or metadata differ.

Because visual comparison is not the same as human judgment, always review the results before removing anything.

Start a Duplicate Scan

Go to Library → Remove Duplicates.

  1. Click + Add Another Directory.
  2. Type a directory path or click Browse to select one.
  3. Add more directories if needed, then click Rescan Directories to refresh the media count.
  4. Click Find Duplicates.

Yaffo starts a background job. You can leave the page while it runs. When the job finishes, click Show Results on its job card.

Review Duplicate Groups

Duplicate results are shown in groups. Each group contains files with the same visual fingerprint.

Duplicate results with two groups and one selected copy in each

Yaffo leaves the first card in each group unselected as the initial keeper and selects the remaining cards for removal. This is only a starting point; it is not a quality judgment. Click any card to toggle its selected outline.

The results currently show previews but not filenames, paths, or capture dates. Compare the visible content carefully. If you cannot confidently identify the keeper, leave that group alone and repeat the scan with a narrower directory.

For each group, compare:

  • the image or video preview;
  • cropping and orientation;
  • visible resolution or compression differences;
  • whether one copy is clearly more complete.

Select only the files you want Yaffo to act on. Leave the keeper unselected.

Choose an Action

The results page supports several actions:

  • Move to Trash: sends selected files to the operating system trash when possible. This is the safest cleanup option.
  • Move to Folder: moves selected files to a folder you choose. If a filename already exists there, Yaffo adds a numeric suffix. This is useful for quarantine or manual review.
  • Permanently Delete: deletes selected files directly.

Prefer Move to Trash or Move to Folder until you trust the results for your library.

Remove Selected Duplicates

After selecting duplicates and choosing an action, click Remove Selected Duplicates. The action starts immediately; there is currently no additional confirmation dialog.

Yaffo starts a background job for the removal action. The original duplicate scan result is replaced by the removal job once processing starts.

Safety Checklist

Before removing files:

  • make sure every selected file is truly a duplicate;
  • make sure at least one good copy remains unselected in each group;
  • prefer Move to Trash or Move to Folder for the first few runs;
  • avoid Permanently Delete unless you have backups;
  • remember that Remove Selected Duplicates starts immediately;
  • run a small scan first if you are testing the workflow.

When No Duplicates Are Found

If Yaffo reports No Duplicates Found, the scan completed without finding two readable files of the same media type with the same visual fingerprint. Try a broader directory or verify that the files are readable. Files do not need to be indexed before this utility can scan them.

Review Results With Ask Yaffo

Ask Yaffo can read a finished scan's results and suggest which copy in each group to keep, such as the higher-resolution copy or the one with faces and tags. It proposes moving the others to the system trash or into a folder for review, as a change you approve. Moving files is off until you turn it on in Settings → Assistant.